New to Town
by jacqui93
Summary: Daniel Burke considers his life perfect. Well at least before his parents announce that his family would be moving from Dallas, Texas to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Now Dan has to make new friends and find somewhere he belongs.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **S.E Hinton owns The Outsiders.

**A/N: **This is my first actual story I've posted on FanFiction so I hope everyone enjoys it. I love encouragement and constructive criticism.

* * *

I sat up with a start when I felt a hard object hit the back of my head. Looking around, I saw my teacher walking away from my desk with a heavy looking book in her old and wrinkled hand. I shuddered and looked over to one of my best mates, Jack, who was laughing his head off at me. I looked to the front of the classroom, making sure the teacher wasn't looking, and then threw a rolled up piece of paper at Jack. He being on the school baseball team, caught it and threw it towards Mrs. Peterson. It hit her smack bang on the head. The class erupted with laughter while Jack leaned over and gave me a high five. Laughing, I leant back into my chair. Mrs. Peterson turned around and gave us all the death stare, the classroom was silent.

"Whoever threw that is going to be sitting in detention," She said looking directly at Jack, who had his arms folded across his chest and was looking at Mrs. Peterson straight in the eye, "It's only the second week of school and I honestly don't want to spend an hour more than I have to with anyone in this classroom, now who thre-?"

* * *

The bell rang and there was a sound of chairs being moved around and feet running out the door. I picked up my books and followed Jack outside the classroom. Jack was only about one inch taller than me, but he always seemed taller than that. He had sandy blonde hair, green eyes and tanned skin. Jack's the type of guy that makes girls turn their heads when they see him. As I mentioned before, he's on the school baseball team and because of his popularity with the girls, the games are always crowded. We've been best mates since we were about seven when our parents sent us to summer camp. By the time the camp was over, Jack and I had become best friends. 

We walked down the hall of my school and went over to our lockers, which had dints and other various marks on them from previous owners. Jack stuffed his books inside and grabbed his jacket. He shut the locker and then leaned up against it, checking out all the girls passing by. I shook my head, grinning and put my books on the shelf. I shut the locker door and leaned on the lockers beside Jack.

"C'mon man, do you really want to stay here longer than we have to?" I said smiling at a pretty brunette as she walked passed.

"Yep, Dan this place is full of hot chicks," Jack said smiling coolly at the same brunette.

He grabbed me by the arm and pulled me down the hall. We turned a corned and walked down the crowded staircase, full of students running up and down them.

"Jack we can go to the drive in if we want to pick up some girls," I said to him.

Jack didn't seem to be listening though; he was just walking along winking at every good looking girl that passed. I pushed the door open and we walked outside. The sunlight hit me and I had to squint before I could see properly.

"Yeah but you can't see if a chick's hot or not in the dark, can you?" Jack said lighting a cigarette, "And there are more girls here, smoke?"

I took one and lit it. I stared at nothing in particular for around five minutes before I realised that Jack was gone. He always seemed to go somewhere without warning me, and then I'd tag along after him.

I found him in the parking lot, sitting on the hood of my Mustang, still smoking his cigarette. Lot's of guys smoke where we live, Jack started at twelve and he only talked me into doing it at the start of summer last year before we started high school. Jack had said that it looks cool and you will be respected if you smoke.

"Hey, I thought you might be here," I said leaning against the car, "Man, thank God it's Friday,"

Jack nodded, smiling at the same time. His eyes were focused on a tree. Jack always looked like that when he was thinking about something. He came from a poorer family than I did. Jack wasn't even middle class, but money didn't really matter to me, only personality. Jack's Dad had gambled away all his family's money through drinking and gambling, and Jack hated him for it. After they has found out, his Dad was kicked out and it was just Jack and his Mom.

"Hey Dan, Jack!" Someone called out to us from what it sounded like, a few metres away.

I looked up to see my sister walking towards us and waving to a group of girls at the same time.

"Aww shit, here she comes," I said grumpily to Jack while taking my cigarette out of my mouth and grinding it into the ground, "Hey Taylor!"

"Man, she couldn't give a crap if you smoked or not," Jack said to me getting of the hood of my car, "She's your sister and probably already knows if you smoke,"

I shrugged and opened the door to my car. It wasn't really my car since I didn't have a license yet. I'm only sixteen and it's my brother's car. He's the one who taught me, so he trusts me enough to drive his car when he doesn't need it. I got in and started it up. Jack threw his cigarette into the dirt somewhere and got in the other side. I sat there, with my elbow resting on the door. Jack was humming along to "Can't Help Falling in Love" by Elvis. After a few minutes of waiting I beeped the horn and looked around for Taylor. She was walking away from a group of trashy looking chicks. They were wearing really short skirts, revealing tops and lots of make up. Taylor opened the back door and climbed into the middle. She leaned over and shut the door.

"You ready kid?" Jack said to Taylor grinning.

"I'm only a year younger than you," she answered him raising one eyebrow, "So I'm not a _kid_,"

Jack laughed and turned up the radio. I pulled out of the lot and we drove along the road. Taylor didn't seem like herself, she just sat in the back seat, arms crossed. I probably got along with her the best; she _was _as she said, only a year younger than us. Taylor had light, straight, golden blonde hair and big brown eyes. She was about five foot two, which made her short among the rest of the kids in her grade, and was thin. Taylor is a pretty girl even if she doesn't think it, we all see guys checking her out in public. She was very tomboyish, which made it hard for her because any respectable girl these days wore appropriate length skirts and blouses. I know that she'd be happy in just jeans and a t-shirt with an old pair of sneakers. Taylor always played baseball, football and any other sports with me. Mom hated it so much, she had always wanted Taylor to be a real girly girl, but Taylor never did.

"So what were you talking to those girls about?" I asked casually, with one hand on the steering wheel.

"Oh the usual, them trying to put me down," Taylor said simply, "Little do they know, people like me more than them," She tapped her nose knowingly. I laughed and kept on driving.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: **S.E Hinton owns The Outsiders.

**A/N: **Thanks so much to fireyhotspot for being my first reviewer.

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We got to Jack's house about twenty minutes after. Jack could walk home if he wanted, but sometimes kids got beaten up if they walked home alone. Jack isn't scrawny but he hasn't got huge muscles either. We waved goodbye to him and Taylor climbed into the front seat of the car and turned the music down. I felt a little guilty as I saw Jack walk into his falling apart home.

Taylor must've noticed because she kept looking at me with a questioning look on her face.

"What?" I asked finally as we drove into our street.

"Nothing, you just seem….distracted" she said to me smiling.

I shrugged and kept on driving. By the time I pulled into our driveway, Taylor seemed to have caught on that I didn't want to talk about it. Our house was a brick house with a blue coloured roof. It was two storeys but a big house nevertheless. I got out of the car and locked the door. Taylor pulled her bag out from the back seat and jumped out. I locked the door behind her and followed her into our house. Taylor dropped her bag at the door and sniffed the air.

"Uh oh I smell burning food," Taylor said walking towards the kitchen, "Oh no, Dad why don't you leave the cooking to Mom?"

"What? I can't see what I'm doing so wrong," Dad said looking pleased with himself.

I laughed and sat down in the seat next to Mom. She was reading a formal looking letter, and was biting her nails. Mom always did that when she was nervous.

"Err Dad, hate to break it to you but its black," Taylor said looking into the pan with a doubtful expression on her face, "And that's definitely _not_ normal,"

I saw Dad give her a disapproving look and turn off the stove. I turned back to the letter Mom was reading. When I leaned over she moved it away from me. She was looking at Dad, who was looking back at her. He nodded and led Taylor to the table. She sat down and stared blankly at both of them.

"Kids we have some bad news," Mom said looking at both of us, "Well, actually it's very good news but for you it may be bad,"

"I got promoted!" Dad said smiling.

"Really? That's great Dad! Why would it be bad?" Taylor said jumping up and giving him a big hug.

"Yeah that's great, you've wanted a promotion for ages," I said smiling.

"So we will be moving to Tulsa," Dad continued smiling.

"What," Taylor said. It was more of a statement than a question. She had stopped hugging Dad and stood up straight. Her eyes were wide as she was looking from Mom to Dad. I could see the pleading look in her eyes, probably praying that it didn't mean what she thought it did.

"Well your father has been promoted and the job is at another hospital in Tulsa," Mom said looking at Taylor, smiling.

"Where on earth is Tulsa?" Taylor asked me, with a blank expression on her face.

"Oklahoma isn't it?" I asked Mom who nodded.

She and Dad walked out of the room, Dad patting Taylor on the head. She was standing there with a shocked expression on her face. I gave her an unconvincing smile which she didn't return.

"We're going to the hospital, your father has to do some paperwork," I heard Mom yell from the front of the house, "We'll be back at around six,"

The door slammed shut and I heard the car drive off. Taylor turned and sat down at the table with me. She stared down at the wood and started fiddling with the cloth. A lock of blonde hair escaped from behind her ear and fell in front of her face. I leaned back in my chair and looked out the window. Suddenly a door banged open and slammed shut. A second later my older brother came running into the room and picked up Taylor, swung her around. When she didn't do anything, he stopped and set her back down again.

"What's the deal? It looks like a funeral in here," Alex said as he went over to the cupboard and started digging around for some food. He pulled out a few cookies and sat down at the table.

"You're an idiot, didn't you get any of what Mom and Dad said on their way out?" a girl said, hitting Alex on the head.

"Yeah, but we're moving! That's a good thing, new adventure," Alex replied rubbing his head, "You've gotta be open minded about these things Heather."

Heather and Alex are my other two siblings; I have one more but more about him later. Heather is nineteen and the most preppy person I know. She was cheerleading captain at high school, student body president _and_ prom queen. She's got long, curly blonde hair which is a little darker than Taylor's. Heather also has brown eyes and is tall and thin. Alex has dark brown hair like me and brown eyes which are always full of some happy emotion. People say I look like Alex's twin, except I'm more serious and two years younger. Alex is eighteen.

"Well I don't see anything to be open minded about, Tulsa better not be a town where all there is to do is read and other boring things. I'm supposed to call Peter," Heather said walking out of the room, "Don't even think about eavesdropping,"

Taylor looked up and grinned. She looked at Alex who nodded and then they both stood up. I pulled them back down.

"She'll kill you," I said.

"Yeah, she's will I guess. I'll go horse riding then, it's the safer option," Taylor said standing up and pushing her chair in.

"Aww Taylor you're letting the team down," Alex said pleading.

Taylor shook her head and walked out of the room. "What's wrong with reading anyway?" She called to us.

"It's boring," Alex and I called back.


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: **S.E Hinton owns The Outsiders.

* * *

The next few weeks were spent packing. Mom and Dad were so excited that it sickened me every time I saw then smile or laugh. Finally it was time for us to leave. We spent the day before saying good bye to everyone we had known all my life. It was terrible. Saying good bye to Jack was probably the worst. He was my first real best friend and it made me sad that I wouldn't see him for a long time. We promised we'd write, even though we probably wouldn't.

We had to sell all our horses because Mom thought it might be too stressful for them to travel all that way, and no matter how many times Taylor said horses travelled these distances all the time, but she refused. It killed Taylor to sell them because she loved those horses like they were real people. The deal was that Alex, Heather, Taylor and I would go with our twenty one year old brother Ben, would drive us in his car to Oklahoma.

At first Mom and Dad weren't really pleased with the idea of all us kids going in the same car as each other but Ben said that they're making us move away from all our friends so the least they could do was let us go in the same car to Oklahoma. It's funny, a few weeks ago I would've laughed at an argument like that, but now it seems more serious that it actually is. The drive to Oklahoma was long and uneventful; we spent half the time sleeping, singing or playing travelling games. At the start of the trip, Taylor and Alex had us in stitches from all the jokes they were telling, but even Taylor got tired of joking around so she pulled out a book and started reading. I can't understand how she can read for that long, especially in a car.

* * *

When we arrived in Tulsa, I couldn't believe how different it felt to Texas. It didn't really look too different to where we were from; it just felt strange, a bit like we didn't belong here. I guess that's how the new kids felt when they came to our school, then it hit me, we were the new kids. On Monday, which was just a few days ago, we would be the people everyone was going to be staring at and judging. I felt my heart beat a little faster than usual; it always did that when I was nervous. 

I took my mind off school by looking at all the houses. At the moment, we seemed to be in a poor neighbourhood. There were kids on the streets smoking and sitting on the curb. I had a feeling that this wasn't where we would be living, but I'd probably fit in better with these kids than the rich ones. When Bed pulled into a street around five or so minutes later, I realised that this must be the "rich" side of town and we were going to live in it. All the houses had big fences and elegant gates, and were very well kept on the outside.

Ben turned into a driveway towards the end of the street and got out. He walked over to the gate and pulled out a key from his jean pocket. Taylor leaned over me to try and see what the house looked like. I pushed her head down and looked. Standing before our car, behind the brick fence and black, iron gates was a big, white house with a dusty blue coloured roof. Ben came back to the car and drove through the gates. We had a driveway, even inside the gates. The house got bigger and bigger as we came closer. It also looked empty and cold. Not like our old house which always looked warm and friendly. Taylor was first out of the car, and I followed after her. She ran up to the side of the house and pulled herself up on the window sill. She peered inside the window, trying to get a glance of inside.

"Taylor get down from there before you kill yourself," Ben said lighting a cigarette. It made me wish I had one, but Ben would kill me if he saw me smoking. I didn't even know he smoked.

Taylor jumped down and walked over to Ben. She scrunched up her nose and looked at me. I change my expression and leant against the car, looking at the sky. She laughed and walked down the driveway.

"Follow her, make sure she doesn't get into trouble," Ben told me.

I nodded and walked down the driveway. Taylor has stopped luckily so I ran to catch her before she moved again. When I got down near the gate I saw Taylor looking at someone. I looked over to where she was and saw a red head girl who looked a few years older than us walking down the path on the other side of the road.

"Do you think we should say hello?" Taylor asked me.

"Why?" I asked her.

Taylor stared blankly at me and rolled her eyes. "Because when you first move somewhere new, meeting people and making friends is one of the first steps to actually belonging you fool," She said, "Unless you want to walk around with no friends,"

"Fine let's go and say hi," I said.

Taylor grinned and jogged out of the gate, pulling me by the arm. I looked back at Ben, Alex and Heather who looked really bored. I shrugged and pulled my arm free of Taylor's grip. The girl crossed the road and was walking towards the gate of the house next to us. She must have seen us because she stopped and looked over. She waved and smiled. Taylor waved back and I just smiled, I never know what to do when meeting new people.

"Hey, you new around here?" the girl asked us when we reached her.

"Yep, we just moved here from Texas. I'm Taylor Burke and this is my brother Daniel Burke, I'm pretty sure that he won't mind if you call him Dan though," Taylor said smiling sweetly.

"Oh right. Well I'm Sherri Valance, but you can call me Cherry. All my friends do because of my hair, it's a pleasure to meet you Taylor and Dan," Cherry said. She was looking at me; I looked at the ground and kicked the dirt pretending I didn't know, "Err does your brother talk?"

I felt myself go bright red. I thought I'd better say something before I looked too stupid. "Yeah, I do," I said. God smooth Dan, smooth, "Umm, you live in the house next door to ours?"

"I'm presuming that yours is the one with the blue roof?" Cherry said smiling, "If it is, then I do,"

I nodded smiling. She was very pretty, in a sophisticated sort of way. Lots of girls I knew didn't look like her at all. Cherry Valance had red hair and green eyes; she was also dressed in neat and classy looking clothes. There was a honk behind us. I turned around to see Mom and Dad pulling in our driveway. Mom poked her head out and waved at us. Taylor waved back and turned back to Cherry.

"Well I'd better go, Mom will be wondering where I am. I just went across to old Mrs. Lewis' house to drop off this cake and then I meet you two," Cherry said smiling, "Y'all had better go too, your parents will probably need your help. Maybe we can all hang out sometime,"

"Yeah that'd be good," Taylor said smiling, "Well see you around Cherry,"

Taylor waved and ran back to our house and disappeared behind the wall. Cherry laughed and brushed her hair out of her face.

"Your sister is very outgoing," she said smiling, "Sweet too. Do you have any other brothers and sisters?"

"Three actually, Ben, Heather and Alex," I said stuffing my fists into my pockets, "Taylor's the youngest so she's the baby, if you know what I mean,"

"Yeah, same as my cousin," Cherry said half laughing, "Well see you later Dan,"

"Bye," I said as she walked back to her house. She looked sad about something, almost as though something bad had happened recently. I shrugged the thought off and walked back to our house.


End file.
